Annual disaster statistical review: numbers and trends 2007

This publication reports on the effects of disasters on human populations in 2007. This second issue analyses the 2007 disaster figures based on the EM-DAT database with comparisons to previous years.

In this year, 414 natural disasters were reported. They killed 16847 persons, affected more than 211 million others and caused over 74.9 US$ billion in economic damages.

Even if a greater diffusion of disaster occurrence across countries was noted, the toll of human impacts remained concentrated across a small number of disasters and countries. Despite no “mega disaster” being reported, the 10 most important disasters in terms of mortality, victims, and damage accounted for 55.6%, 85.2%, and 66.2% respectively of all the reported deaths, people affected, and damages.